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Non-invasive observation of spatio-temporal neural activity of large neural populations distributed over the entire brain of complex organisms is a longstanding goal of neuroscience [1,2]. Recently, genetically encoded calcium indicators (GECIs) have revolutionized neuroimaging by enabling mapping the activity of entire neuronal populations in vivo [3]. Visualization of these powerful sensors with fluorescence microscopy has however been limited to superficial regions while deep brain areas have so far remained unreachable [4]. We have developed a volumetric multispectral optoacoustic tomography platform for imaging neural activation deep in scattering brains [5]. The developed methodology can render 100 volumetric frames per second across scalable fields of view ranging between 50-1000 mm3 with respective spatial resolution of 35-150µm. Experiments performed in immobilized and freely swimming larvae and in adult zebrafish brains expressing the genetically-encoded calcium indicator GCaMP5G demonstrated, for the first time, the fundamental ability to directly track neural dynamics using optoacoustics while overcoming the depth barrier of optical imaging in scattering brains [6].
It was further possible to monitor calcium transients in a scattering brain of a living adult transgenic zebrafish expressing GCaMP5G calcium indicator [7]. Fast changes in optoacoustic traces associated to GCaMP5G activity were detectable in the presence of other strongly absorbing endogenous chromophores, such as hemoglobin. The results indicate that the optoacoustic signal traces generally follow the GCaMP5G fluorescence dynamics and further enable overcoming the longstanding optical-diffusion penetration barrier associated to scattering in biological tissues [6].
The new functional optoacoustic neuroimaging method can visualize neural activity at penetration depths and spatio-temporal resolution scales not covered with the existing neuroimaging techniques. Thus, in addition to the well-established capacity of optoacoustics to resolve vascular anatomy and multiple hemodynamic parameters deep in scattering tissues, the newly developed methodology offers unprecedented capabilities for functional whole brain observations of fast calcium dynamics.
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